|
Live | 
 enlarge | Artist: Swing Out Sister
Label: Shanachie
Category: Music
List Price: $17.98
Buy New: $11.38
You Save: $6.60 (37%)
New (31) Used (9) from $10.38
Rating:  18 reviews
Sales Rank: 144392
Format: Live
Media: Audio CD
Discs: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 5.6 x 5 x 0.5
MPN: 5756
UPC: 016351575623
EAN: 0016351575623
ASIN: B000A0GOMI
Release Date: August 23, 2005
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: Brand new and factory sealed. Most orders shipped within 24 hours directly from our warehouse.
| |
| Tracks:
| • | Surrender / World Out of Control | | • | Get in Touch With Yourself | | • | La La Means I Love You | | • | Sugar Free | | • | Stoned Soul Picnic | | • | Closer Than the Sun / Forever Blue | | • | Heaven Only Knows | | • | Filth & Dreams | | • | Now You're Not Here | | • | Am I the Same Girl | | • | Breakout/When Morning Comes | | • | Twilight World |
|
| Similar Items:
|
| Customer Reviews:
 Glad I skipped this album September 13, 2008
hankaaron (Austin, TX. United States)
I listened to this album from a Napster subscription. And I'm glad I did that instead of purchasing the album. This is a very uninspiring effort from SOS. The album has a very hollow cheap sound, thanks to the overusage of atmospheric synthesizer.
All the energy of the performance is used up on the first track "Surrender"- which is very promising for the rest of the album. However, the other songs are very lackluster.
It doesn't help that this live performance features material that was weak to begin with. Why was so much focus was placed on the "Filth & Dreams" album? The biggest problem I had with "Filth & Dreams" was the production. The songwriting was probably the best effort of all the SOS albums. But here, the production is even worse on those songs.
I'm also a big "Earth, Wind and Fire" fan, and couldn't help but smile when SOS work two old EWF songs ("Sun Goddess" and "Evil") into "Breakout" and "Twilight World". But that alone is not enough to make the album more worthwile.
I have to give the album two stars because it pales so much from the "...Jazz Cafe" recording. Hopefully, the next live recording will be much better.
A Rembrandt painted on piece of plywood... April 12, 2007
Frank Jones (Chicago, IL, USA)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This album was put out in 2005 and had zero marketing. It's like they did their absolute best to screw SOS. It's hard to believe that a small (i.e. I have no idea who they are) label like Shanachie Records has the rights to this prodigious musical duo. Its like the restaurant with the best food in the world doesn't advertise, and is in this small coastal town in the middle of nowhere, has decent service and only a handful of people know this.
The musical quality of the content of the CD makes up for the abysmal quality of the physical CD. The physical CD is thin, weak and the artwork looks like it was outsourced to some firm in Asia. If this is what they print up for the public, I can't imagine what the marketing was like when this was released. The editing on this CD is also extremely poor. Some tracks with no fade in or out, some with fade, etc.
In spite of the effort to make the physical appearance of the album bad, it shines like the Star of Bethlehem. The musicality, arrangements, dynamics and vocalizations more than make up for the efforts to kill this soon to be classic work - as if Smokey Robinson, Marvin Gaye, Al Green, Grover Washington Jr. were producing it and had painted a musical image on this CD. Corrine's beautiful expressive presence and voice is only magnified by Andy's stunning musical effort. In spite of the editing, this album is like a Rembrandt painted on piece of plywood - it is THAT GOOD.
The first track for non-SOS fans to listen to should be La La La (Means I Love You). This is a sunny, warm, spring day in Central Park, reminiscing about your love, captured in a 5 minute timeframe. Brilliant arrangement, with Marvin Gaye influencing the Delfonics original score, with current instrumentation. It compelled me look for the original song and hear the other works by the Delfonics.
Sugarfree is a melancholy, lyric, heavily 70's influenced song. Corrine's dynamics and attention to lyrics makes this song the best individual track on the CD. This is acid jazz the way it was meant to be, staying true to the soulful past. Listen to it once, watch it become your favorite track without you knowing it.
If you're a Swing Out Sister fan, you will be thrilled by the new arrangements of the older songs, all of which reinvent them with a playfulness that makes them your favorite again. "Now you're not here" is a great example.
Steely Dan, Jamiroquai and SOS fans should try this epic live work, regardless of anything you have, and realize that if you didn't think Swing Out Sister were seriously talented musicians and arrangers before listening to this, you will be happily convinced.
VERY nice set -- updated jazz vibe for familiar songs February 21, 2006
Peace Brotha (Ohio, United States)
6 out of 7 found this review helpful
Swing Out Sister never disappoints me with their musical artistry. I recently had the opportunity to see them live here in Ohio last summer and they were absolutely phenomenal.
This CD basically captures what that set was like. The songs are given the familiar SOS reinvention, paying respect to the originals while creating something totally fresh and inventive. This time, the music is washed in jazzy arrangements that are similar to the Jazz Cafe project, but with more R&B influences.
Corrinne's lovely vocals match her personality and physical beauty, as always. The band and background singers are second to none; another SOS hallmark.
That said, one of the prior reviewers is right about the annoying skips in this recording. Those skips come from improper editing between tracks. For live recordings, there should be NO breaks between tracks (unless there's a fadeout). Someone at Shanachie apparently forgot this, and the result is a disturbing half-second cut-out between songs.
Other than that annoyance, the sound quality of the music itself is decent to very good throughout.
Another disappointment noted by the reviewer is the overall appearance of the CD. It does look like a bootleg. Swing Out Sister is an eclectic group, so one could almost make a case that they wanted the CD to look like that. However, I'm guessing that even the group didn't want the effect to be this drastic, if that's the case.
I would recommend this CD in a heartbeat to any prior SOS fan as well as anyone that appreciates "nutritious ear candy." Please don't blame the group for their label's missteps. Instead, enjoy another masterpiece from this group that has been lovingly creating wonderful and fresh music for nearly 20 years.
 A disapointing effort February 21, 2006
M. Mann (SW Florida)
6 out of 10 found this review helpful
Let me state first off that I am very much a SOS fan. That said, I waited anxiously for the disc to arrive, however upon listening, my heart sank as I realized that unlike "Live at the Jazz cafe" this disc is a recording of a concert done on the cheap. There is no horn section. This CD is comprised of stripped down tracks knocked out on a synthesizer. If you are expecting the big SOS production, forget it. The music sounds like a night club act covering their songs. Sorry Corinne and Andy, although you are the masters of re-packaging the same material again and again, you need to keep flawed product from reaching the market. If anyone is looking for a good SOS live CD, skip this one (which is even devoid of liner notes, or artwork of any kind, resembling a bootleg), and go with "Jazz Cafe" instead.
Worst sound quality ever! January 19, 2006
Robert Dereimer (GRAND RAPIDS, MI United States)
3 out of 5 found this review helpful
I don't know if I have a freak pressing, but my CD sounds like a bad FM station with hiccups and blank spots. I tried to contact the record company, but no reply. I will probably return it to Amazon for another copy. Has anyone else had this problem? Outside of the sound quality, the concert itself sounds great as far as songs are concerned. Maybe the Japanese version is the one to buy.
|
|
|
Used CDs | |
